120,000 miles, 4 cyl, 4 door, a/c works, no weird noises, tranny shifts good. tranny oil appears bubbly, but smells ok check engine light on, occasional rough(low) idle might try to stall. body is decent, some small surface rust nothing serious. anything in particular to watch out for. owner is asking 300 bones. mostly going to be the wifey's going to work car.

 

For $300...how can you go wrong???

 

sounds like a good one. focus' aren't to bad.

 

Early Ford Focus were notorious for their ignition key lock cylinder getting stuck. Problem is solved when people replaced the original lock cylinder with an improved replacement. Early Ford Focus were available with two different 2.0L engines. The 8 valves SOHC 2.0L SPI engine or the 16 valves DOHC 2.0L Zetec engine. The Zetec had a problem with the plastic thermostat housing cracking and leaking coolant where it mount to the cylinder head. The reason being that oil dripping from the valve cover onto the thermostat housing caused the rubber O-ring between the cylinder head and thermostat housing to swell with enough force to crack the housing. Some early Ford Focus had mis routed positive battery cable that came in contact with the hot exhaust pipe causing the cable insulation to melt and short out to ground.

 

cool thanks for the tips. thats what i'm looking for, that and if there are any major troubles to run screaming from. so far it sounds like an ok beater car.

 

When my Grandpa passed away in May of this year, I bought his 2000 Focus Wagon SE for an everyday driver. I was driving an 04 Freestar SE (good van), but that was kind of "boaty" for everyday commuting and not very fun to drive.

My Grandpa did not drive much, he was once in a MAJOR front end collision (I want to say 15K in damage) and it got hail damage from the storms in June UP here.......but I bought it anyway. He purchased it new in 2000 and it had 25,900 miles on it when I took ownership.

It's a great little wagon, I love drive it so much more than my Freestar, the handling is good for a wagon, power is decent and it seems very reliable. It does have a low idle at times and seems like it could stall, but never has. It does have the 16V 2.0 engine. I have head the 8 V SOHC engines had problems, so I'd avoid those.

I plan on keeping this wagon for a long time. I have heard the low idle is a problem with these cars, but I don't know what the fix is. Also, it seems to have some part-throttle very light surging, but it's not bad enough for me to worry about. I serviced the trans, flushed the cooling system and put new plugs in it, the fuel filter I replaced for Grandpa last year so that has minimal mileage on it and I put a new PCV valve in as well.

For $300 that is a STEAL, go for it!

 

For a beater car doesn't seem like you can go wrong for $300, heck with scrap prices up you would be close just scrapping it.

 

Daughter has 01 Focus with zetec eng and had the problem that stevieweevie talked about with the bad thermo housing, but not too difficult to fix. Her car was totaled in 05 and we bought it back and had it fixed and now has salvage title, but the thing keeps on going. pwr window motor went bad on rear window that never gets used. Allso has occasional rough idle. Bad spark plug wires. overall a good little car with respectable mpg(over 30).

 

I would imagine by now you've bought the car (I didn't read every reply in the thread), but I just wanted to put my 2 cents in about Focuses. My wife and I own an 01 and an 07, and they are both all around great cars - nothing fast, nothing terribly fancy - just excellent little workhorse cars. Well worth it. And you should get around 30mpg unless you live in a really hilly area.

 

yup bought it last friday, spent most of saturday afternoon, cleaning andoiling stuff. other than 1 rotted out vacuum hose it seems really good. gave us 33per canadian gallon on the first tank.

 

good luck with your new car